Delores Conway, Director, USC Casden Real Estate Economics Forecast, is quoted April 8, 2009 in the San Diego Union Tribune:
County's rental market "loosening up a little"
San Diego Union Tribune
By Emmet Pierce
...A fourth-quarter survey of apartment complexes shows rental occupancies down slightly in San Diego County as the deepening recession continues to place economic pressure on renters and landlords alike.
"What we are seeing in San Diego is apartments are loosening up a little," said Delores Conway, director for the Casden Real Estate Economics Forecast at the USC Lusk Center for Real Estate. "Now we have more vacancies, but it still is considered a tight market. Rents have been stable."
Other rental markets in Southern California are faring much worse as unemployed tenants move away or double up with friends to save money, Conway said yesterday. The occupancy rate here dropped from 97.5 percent a year ago to 94.9 percent, Conway said. The survey found that rental rates within the county rose 1.9 percent year over year to an average rent of $1,340.
Conway predicted that rents would rise by about 1 percent over the next two years. Despite heavy layoffs in the county's construction industry, some elements of the local economy are holding up. "You have the military bases there, and lot of the military are renters," she said. "Also, there are quite a few educational institutions and many of these people are renters. Some industries are actually doing well: biotechnology, health care and telecommunications..."
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